Wannabe Trump Assassin Faces Arraignment

LAS VEGAS (CN) — Michael Steven Sandford, the 20-year-old British citizen who tried to seize a policeman’s gun to kill Donald Trump at a June political rally, is due at a 3 p.m. arraignment and plea hearing today in Federal Court. Sandford tried to grab a police officer’s holstered gun at a June 18 rally for Trump at the Mystere Theatre in the Treasure Island Casino. A Secret Service agent assigned to protect Trump said in a June 20 affidavit that Sanford told him he had come to Nevada from New Jersey to try to kill Trump. A federal grand jury on June 29 indicted Sandford on two counts of being an undocumented alien in possession of a firearm and one count of impeding and disrupting government business or functions. U.S. Attorney Daniel Bogden said Sandford went a Las Vegas gun range on June 17 to learn how to use a Glock 9mm handgun. He told the Secret Service agent he fired 20 shots there, and that it was the first time he had ever fired a gun. The next day, Bogden said, Sandford “approached a uniformed LVMPD officer and attempted to seize the officer’s Glock 9mm handgun by grabbing the holster and handle of the firearm with both hands in an attempt to remove it from the holster.” The Secret Service agent said Sandford was told of his Miranda rights, but agreed to talk, and when asked “why he had attempted to grab Officer Jacob’s sidearm, Sandford replied, ‘To shoot and kill Trump.'” Sandford said he expected to be killed while doing so, the agent said. Sandford said he had been in the United States for more than a year, lived in Hoboken, N.J, and traveled to California and Nevada to try to kill Trump. He is in federal custody and faces up to 10 years in prison and a $250,000 for each of the three counts against him.